The League of Women Voters Of Greater Tuscaloosa hosted its annual “Meet Your Legislators” virtual meeting on Jan. 14 to promote communication between Alabamians and their state legislators. There were a wide variety of legislators present, including state Senate minority leader Bobby Singleton, D- Greensboro, and state Reps. Bryan Brinyark, R- Northport; Ronald Bolton R- Northport; Cynthia Almond, R-Tuscaloosa; Christopher England, D- Tuscaloosa; and Curtis Travis, D- Tuscaloosa.
The event has been a longtime tradition of the LWVGT. Kim Bailey, a board member and the Lobby Corps director, emphasized the importance of having an event that promotes communication between legislators and constituents to tell them what is going on in their community.
“Legislators work for the voters, so this event gives them some accountability by allowing constituents an opportunity to hear them speak and find out how to contact them,” Bailey said.
Topics discussed during the meeting included the lower budget for this year, healthcare, education, assault weapons, the economical impact of the Blue Creek Mine and early voting. At the beginning of the meeting, Brinyark mentioned the lack of infrastructure for mental health in Alabama. Almond later revisited the topic, noting that it will be brought up in the February legislative session.
The legislators had unanimous views on the proposed bills to ban glock switches across the state.
“Coming to any agreement about firearms is a heavy lift, so for us to be at this point is a monumental sign of progress,” England said.
However, assault weapons seemed to be a point of conflict. Brinyard, in favor of protecting all Second Amendment rights, pointed out that it is still a semi-auto firearm in that it only fires when you pull the trigger, while Sen. Singleton disagreed, preferring that assault weapons be banned to protect the community.
Additionally, Travis, a member of the Ports, Waterways and Intermodal Transit Members Committee, said that most people don’t realize that because of the Blue Creek Coal Mine in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama is looking to export metallurgical coal, the most expensive coal in the world, to Europe, South America, China and Japan.
“It is now in production, as of September, and they are hiring 400-450 miners out of Brookwood for a minimum of $100,000 per year. $1.6 billion is going to be generated by just federal royalties alone. It’s going to be a game changer for the county, district and even state,” Brinyark said.
Along with this new development in the state, the legislators discussed early voting as a means of encouraging voter participation. There was some dissent regarding the logistics of early voting because of security risk concerns; however, the legislation present at the meeting stated that they would work to pass bills to extend early voting times considering disadvantages of educators and the disabled in the voting process.
Nevertheless, the LWVGT and legislators both encouraged citizens to vote in the coming municipal election.
“Never think your vote doesn’t count, because especially in local elections, every vote really does count,” Bailey said. “So get out there and cast your ballot.”